8 I CHRONICLESnON MIGHT by Momcilo Selicn”I chant the new empire …”nPERSPECTIVEn—Walt WhitmannWalt Whitman sang what he saw—in 1860, he gave anname to Madison’s and Jefferson’s vision of the newncommonwealth. “[Our success],” Jefferson had said inn1801, “furnishes a new proof of the falsehood of Montesquieu’sndoctrine, that a republic can be preserved only in an%:niAn•it^^F ”•0i^^-n* r’Jv .. 1^ ^ak£i fi J^’ -.nI oT’^ ‘ imBKr .-iTj « -S’n;*.^.n*.nin^V =-»**»!.*?nnnsmall territory. The reverse is the truth.” Despite Jefferson’snbelief, however, the American Experiment will probably benremembered as the only reluctant empire in history: nonHomers, Vergils, or Kiplings, but a Whitman, sang itsnpraise. Theodore Roosevelt, the only unabashedly imperialistnPresident, saw America as an international do-goodernthat spoke softly and carried a big stick.nYet, as Brooks Adams wrote: “Nature is omnipotent; andnnations must float with the tide. Whither the exchangesnflow, they must follow.” Theodore Roosevelt’s friend andnadvisor, Adams may not have been nurtured an imperialist,nbut, like Whitman, Roosevelt, or even Jefferson, he couldnnot deny what he beheld: an immense, rich, populousncountry, in a world that had become no more meek than innThemistocles’ time. His fear of a glacial America, slippingntowards rot and destruction, finds its echoes in the hearts ofnmany conservatives. A melancholy generalizer and a visionary.nBrooks Adams tried to tell us that destinies,nmanifest or not, may not be shirked in a world of machinelikenmen. As Woodrow Wilson set up the stage for a centurynof wars, Adams might have felt vindicated—but whethernanything salved his soul, we may never know. If early-20thcenturynAmerica was a pain to him, what would he saynnow?nWhile this country basks in video games, Irangate,npacifism, affirmative action, “justice for all,” and junk mailnpromoting Hammacher Schlemmer “solar-ventilated golfncaps,” Henry Ford’s words should be recalled. “In mynmind,” wrote Ford, the creator of the production line,n”nothing is more abhorrent than a life of ease. . . . Letnevery American become steeled against coddling. … It isna drug.” Though Ford has been accused of many things, henwas, above all, an American: In my youth in Yugoslavia, Inremember the almost religious awe his cars caused. “I cannreach the engine like a cow’s udder,” a mechanic friend toldnme, “nothing like a Mercedes, or any of this Europeannjunk, where you have to use a can opener before you cannget at anything.” Henry Ford was an American because henwas fearless: He would look, see, think, and do, regardlessnof any chorus. It took a long time (until the 1970’s) fornAmerican windbreakers to start boasting false pockets, badnzippers, and the theatrical tailoring, typical of Italy, HongnKong, or Taiwan.n”During the seven and a half years that I was President,”nwrote Theodore Roosevelt, “this nation behaved in internationalnmatters towards all other nations precisely as annhonorable man behaves to his fellow man. We made nonpromise which we could not and did not keep. We made nonthreat which we did not carry out.” Henry Ford and CharlesnLindbergh would have concurred. Though resolutely op-n